It's among the top issues in this year's race for Sacramento mayor: homelessness and how the city's future elected leader plans to tackle it.

The four mayoral candidates -- Angelique Ashby, Tony Lopez, Russell Rawlings and Darrel Steinberg -- shared their stances with voters at a public forum Saturday afternoon at Trinity Church in Sacramento.

Advertisement

"It's a tough thing to tackle, it's just going to take time and money,” said Kathleen Ellis, who attended the forum because her daughter, who is mentally ill, used to be homeless.

The candidates discussed everything from the city’s "No Camping Ordinance" to how to generate funding for low-income housing.

For many in the standing room-only crowd, the topic is personal.

“I live in Sacramento and I'm one of the homeless people here,” David Andre said.

“My daughter was homeless. She's not now, but there's got to be a way we can do better with these people,” Ellis said.

When KCRA 3 asked voters what solutions presented by the candidates seemed the most attainable, many said the creation of more affordable housing.

"Section 8 housing so that landlords can't discriminate,” Andre said.

"Whatever it takes to get these people who are landlords to open their facilities to more people," Ellis said.

Each candidate feels strongly he or she is the right person to make progress on this issue, sharing with KCRA 3 the first thing they would do about homelessness if elected mayor.

"Amp up the conversation with the county because the county and their role with mental health, children’s services, drug and alcohol has to be at the center of this discussion,” Ashby said.

"Do a full audit of the city. Once we find out how much money we have, we allocate it to different causes,” Lopez said.

"Suspend the anti-camping ordinance, quite simply because it brings the problem front and center,” Rawlings said.

"Draw down tens of millions of dollars from state Prop. 63 fund to begin making Sacramento a housing-first community,” Steinberg said.